Hollow Inside
by akblake
Summary: What really happened after the end of The Big Bang Job... Eliot may seem fine in time for the next episode, but that's only because Parker helped him through that night.


**A/N: First, I *adore* feedback- it brightens my day and makes my muses giggle :) Second, this is a tag to ****_The Big Bang Job_****. Eliot kills a double handful of guys and then is just business-as-usual in time for them to take over San Lorenzo? Yeah, don't think so. Time to call in Parker! Continues in my ****_Friends_**** universe, but isn't a sequel. **

Eliot disappeared immediately after the team left the hangar. He couldn't stand the happy atmosphere, their joviality at destroying the bomb clashing with the hollow feeling inside his soul, and he needed to get out. He had the perfect place in mind- a tiny safe house he kept in the worst part of Boston where he could fall apart in solitude.

Parker watched out of the corner of her eye as he slowly fell back, fading into shadow, until no one noticed that he wasn't with them anymore. She'd seen the shadows in his eyes and had caught a faint whiff of cordite as she passed where he'd been standing with Nate. Parker may not have much experience with "normal" activities, but she was far from stupid- she'd used guns for protection before joining Nate's team, and was very familiar with them. For her to catch the scent of it lingering in the air, faint as it was, he had to have virtually been bathed in it, not just fighting people who were shooting at him. She didn't see any blood, only an oily residue soaking his lower legs, and he wasn't moving like he was covering an injury, so she decided to let him retreat for a while before making her excuses to Hardison and going after him.

Two hours later, Parker was staring at Eliot's grungy front door with worry. This was the only place he'd logically retreat to; his house in the county was immediately out, it was his "normal" space, and he wasn't injured to need his emergency apartment, so that left her with this tiny little hole in the wall. Her worry stemmed from the fact that this wasn't a safe area yet Eliot, a justifiably paranoid person, had left his door completely unlocked. Instead of breaking in, Parker simply opened the door and walked right into a disaster area.

From a lack of blood smears on the walls, Parker felt safe in assuming that all the destruction was caused by the compact form sitting on the floor and not by fighting off a pack of mysterious assailants. "Eliot?" she called while still very much out of immediate reach. The dingy room was roughly fifteen feet wide by thirty long, to her experienced eye, and appeared to have been a storage room of some kind in a previous life given its concrete walls. Her footsteps crunched over splinters of wood, glass, and pieces of something which she couldn't identify, and Parker knew that Eliot was aware of her even if he didn't acknowledge her presence until she'd crouched down in front of him.

"Go away," he rasped through a throat hoarse from screaming out his anger. Her presence only brought him out of his head, a reminder that there were people who cared for him more than he deserved. When Parker simply gave him a flat look in response to his rude order, he reacted. Eliot burst from his seat on the floor, picked her up by her waist, and carried her to the door intent on bodily removing her. Parker, though, didn't go along with his plan.

Given that she could shimmy around lasers and worm into any space, as boneless as a cat, it was incredibly simple for her to wrap her legs around his waist and tangle her arms with his to turn a hold into a bear hug. Eliot would remove one of her limbs only to have the other three fasten into new positions and he couldn't pry her loose- it was like wrestling with an octopus! Gravity didn't seem to be involved as Parker monkeyed onto his back, curled sideways under his arms, even upside down at one point, and Eliot exhausted his burst of irritation in the face of her stubborn refusal to let him get rid of her. He tiredly abandoned his plan and stood, arms stretched out at his sides. "Fine, you can stay!" he growled out and felt her tighten her hold for a handful of seconds while she considered if it was a ruse.

Parker unwound herself to stand in front of him, slightly flushed from her exertion. "I'm going to tell you what I know, and you're not going to give me any details," she bluntly stated, not giving him a chance to speak, "You were shooting tonight." Parker narrowed her eyes to silence Eliot as he opened his mouth. "I don't care why, like I said- no details. You don't like guns, and it had to be bad for you to have used them, so I know that you had a good reason even if you're now beating yourself up about it." Eliot looked away, breaking eye contact, and she knew that she'd assumed right. That was the shock part of her plan, now for the thought part, "You said in the park that Moreau's men were the worst, so by shooting them you've saved not only Nate's life but every single innocent person that they would have killed." Parker let him digest that. Many things in life she understood and allowed to pass unremarked, but sometimes her teammates needed her to state the obvious.

Eliot swallowed hard as her point hit home. He wasn't quite ready to forgive himself yet but he was honest enough to admit that Parker was right. Those men were murderers who killed indiscriminately, men, women, and children, and they would have kept killing until something stopped them. It didn't matter if it was his bullet or a competitor's, but that's what it would take to stop men like that; jail simply provided a vacation until their employer paid for their release, and there was no way to beat a conscience into one who has none. Eliot came out of his thoughts to see that Parker had been silently gathering up his bedding from the wreckage of the room and had remade the pallet he used as a bed.

Parker figured that he had to be beyond exhausted, she was a little peaky herself after the very stressful day, and hoped that he'd agree to sleep rather than go back to the partial catatonia he'd been in when she arrived. "Hey, Nate wants to immediately start planning how to take down Moreau now that he's fled the country. If you want to help then you'll need to sleep and get yourself together," she stated. He wasn't ready for her heavy-handed attempts at an emotional appeal, so she opted for easier to process logic.

He didn't want to sleep but also knew that it was pointless to try and avoid it- dreams would come regardless of whether he slept voluntarily or passed out. He also knew that it would be pointless to try and eject Parker again, so he simply went along with her. This room, more a cell than a room, didn't have bathing facilities, so Eliot had to sleep how he was. He did, however, remove his shoes and outer layers to sleep in his comparatively cleaner boxers and undershirt. Parker tucked him in and then sat back to cat nap against the wall as the floor was covered in the remains of what furniture had been in the room before his anger had erupted in destruction.

Not long after he drifted off, Parker was snapped back to awareness by tiny shifting noises. From the twitching muscles and rapid eye movements under his closed lids, Eliot appeared to be fighting a nightmare and she well remembered the best way to wake him from one. Parker slipped off her shoe and tossed it at him, only to watch as it bounced off his chest without waking him. She reached out a foot and poked at his knee while trying to keep a safe distance.

At the contact Eliot exploded off the bed and had her throat in his hands even before his eyes blinked open. Parker refused to give into her body's instinct to struggle and instead reached up to gently pet his forearms, all the while watching his eyes. Awareness slowly chased out the terror of his nightmare and she could see the moment that the situation clicked. Fear of a different kind filled his face and he immediately released her. Parker could see that he was about to scold her, and likely apologize for something that he couldn't control, so she spoke first. "I threw my shoe at you, but it didn't work."

That stopped his train of thought for a second. "Why'd you throw your shoe?" Parker never ceased to confound him, and throwing a shoe at him rather than a pillow was just one of her more tame actions.

"Well, I could have thrown yours but I didn't want to break your nose," she patiently explained the obvious. Besides, he hadn't left anything intact in the room and even she wouldn't throw a handful of glass or wood.

"Parker, you gotta leave. I'll be fine alone and it ain't safe to stay," Eliot ordered, choosing not to argue over shoes in favor of getting her out of harm's way. Parker's snort of disdain brought him up short.

"I'll be staying right here, thanks. First, you didn't grab my throat hard enough to even leave red marks," Parker tipped up her head to show unmarred pale skin. "Second, I could have gotten loose if I wanted to. You won't hurt me, Eliot, and you're not the only one who has nightmares."

Eliot had to admit that she was right on the second point- she could be rather vicious when she wanted to be, and that was before he'd started working with her on advanced hand-to-hand. It still didn't sit right with him to have her so close, where he could still hurt her, and if she wouldn't leave for her own safety then he'd stay awake.

Parker wasn't a fool and curled up next to him on top of the covers. If he wanted to be noble, then she'd just have to change tactics. "I'm tired and want to sleep, and you _need_ to sleep, so lay back down," she bossed and waited for him to comply before scooting back against him. "When I have nightmares, I always hug Bunny to make them go away. You don't have one, so I'll be your Bunny tonight and keep away the nightmares."

Giving in, Eliot gently wrapped an arm around Parker's waist and settled under the covers. Her warm presence lulled him into dozing and then soft sleep. He still had disturbing dreams throughout the night, but every time he'd start to settle into a nightmare, Parker would stroke the arm around her waist to remind his subconscious that she was there. She'd get a tight hug in response, as if to confirm that she really was there, and then he'd settle back into peaceful sleep again. Eliot would still have to compartmentalize the night's actions in the morning, but with a bit of solid sleep and even more solid friendship, he could find his balance again.


End file.
